Ocean Song
by FallenHero84
Summary: A new and more adult take on the classic story by Hans Christian Andersen. Cora is a mermaid. She is 111 years old, going through a divorce, and the death of her mother. She's never been interested in the overworld before, but suddenly it calls to her. She becomes a human and becomes involved in the French Revolution.
1. Prologue

PROLOGUE

**Copenhagen, 1807**

* * *

The ocean stretched out endlessly, far away as the eye could see. Even in the middle of the night, moonlight shown down upon it, creating endless paths.

In front of that ocean, a city was under siege and is burning in flames.

A six-year-old boy ran to the edge of the seashore. His name was Peter and he was exhausted beyond all belief. He looked back at the violence on land behind him. It was the height of the Napoleonic Wars.

He then looked down and saw something washed up in the waves. It was a starfish.

He picked it up, watching it slightly move in his hand. He then looked out at the sea.

"Peter! Come back!"

He turned around to see his mother had found shelter with other citizens of the invaded city. She was calling from one of the store's cellars, evading the flames. Peter heard her, yet kept looking out.

He stares out at the sea. It called to him.

His name was called again and he yelled back:

"Just a moment, Mama."

"Peter! You're going to get killed!"

But he was lost in thought. She stared out at a large boulder several feet from the shore. Had he seen something?

He turned back to his mother.

"I thought I saw a maiden out there. By the rocks."

"This isn't the time for flights of fancy!"

Peter hesitantly turned back and headed to the shelter.

Far off in the sea, behind the boulder, there was indeed a young maiden in the water, hiding, sneaking a peak at the castle. Her name was Nerina, and she had the appearance of a young woman. She wore two clam-shells to conceal her breasts and was otherwise nude.

With one more look at the violence on land, she dove into the sea, revealing everything from the waist down-she did not have legs but instead a giant fish-tail. She was a mermaid.

* * *

Nerina swam further and further down, passing enormous schools of fish. It was a long, long descent, far down in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower and as clear as crystal.

Finally she arrived at the bottom of the ocean, and there dwelled her fellow merfolk.


	2. The Funeral

A mermaid funeral was about to take place. Various merfolk were gathered around a small altar in the deepest of all seabeds. They swam to and fro, ready for the ceremony to begin.

And the mermaid of the hour swam out. She was an old mermaid named Yara, and although she had the physical appearance of only a middle-aged human woman, she was in fact three hundred years old. And now, she was saying her goodbyes to all her friends.

"Thank you...thank you, all…"

"Goodbye, Yara. We are going to miss you," the mermaids all said to her.

"That's very kind of you," she replied, "I cannot believe it is almost time."

She swam towards the center of the circle near the altar. There she was joined by the Elder, the merman who was overseeing the ceremony.

"Thank you all for attending Yara's funeral," the Elder began, "Today, a mermaid turns three hundred, which means we pay our respects before she passes on. Such are the ways of the moon. Now, in her last few minutes, she has asked for her daughter Cora to sing for us."

A sad and melancholic mermaid emerged from the crowd. She had long, flowing, bright red hair and blue eyes. Her fin was one of the greenest and she was considered one of the most beautiful mermaids in the ocean. Her name was Cora.

Cora hesitated for a moment, then began singing a very sad aria; she had a voice sweeter than any human could ever be capable of. As she sang, her long, beautiful hair floated around her head. She had the physical appearance of a human in her twenties or thirties, but she was eleventy-one years old.

The entire crowd was very touched by her song.

After finishing, Cora swam over to Yara. Approaching her mother in those final moments before death, she was solemn and a little distracted. Yara looked up at her.

"That was beautiful, dear one."

"Thank you, Mama. Are you feeling alright?"

They clasped hands.

"Ready for death as I shall ever be. Cora-I know your life has not turned out the way you wanted-"

"Mama, please-"

"-but you need to get out there and truly live! Remember, you are a direct descendent of Neptune. We are proud to be a family that saw the dawn of time."

Cora took this in, but remained very hesitant.

"It is time now. Go take your own journey."

Yara kissed Cora on the forehead, then lay flatly on the altar.

As the exact minute-anniversary of her birth arrived, her body began slowly dissolving into sea-foam. It began with her fin, then up to her hips, and finally her entire body dissolved-

-and just like that, Yara was no more.

The merfolk all took this in, murmuring about what they have witnessed.

The Elder then gave a final eulogy.

"So passes Yara, she of the ethereal voice. May you all go forth and pass this feeling of peace with those around you, as the season of Lunar White begins. The Sea King thinks of you all this time of year."

And Cora solemnly swam back home.


	3. Wreckages

Resting among the seabeds...

The merfolk danced in their regular habitat. They are a matriarchal and agrarian culture. Mermaid life is very wondrous and carefree. They live in grottos, coves, and often on the seabeds themselves. They do not have money, crime, violence, a workforce, or social classes. It is a utopia.

One of the most important days in a mermaid's life is when she turns _eleventy-one_, 111, a rather curious number, and the date of her coming of age. Cora had turned eleventy-one last month, only a few weeks after her divorce. It had been a very bitter divorce, and after eighty-four years of trying to make their marriage work, her husband had left her with nothing.

Now, Cora sighed as she swam around in her small dwelling. Several small fish swam to and fro throughout her home, and Cora petted a small blue angelfish.

"Hello, Wanda. You are very fortunate to only live ten years."

A familiar voice from her front door called:

"Cora. We come to pay our respects."

Cora turned to find her three best friends peering in her dwelling: Storm was a confident merman of dark skin, Kenda was a young fifteen-year-old mermaid and still a child, and Nerina was an adventurous mermaid who loved to talk.

Cora smiled at her friends.

"Enter, you three."

Hugs came all around and soon the four were lazing about, their fins waving back and forth.

"How do you feel, Cora?"

"I have seen better days, Kenda."

"When my parents passed, it took me by shock."

But Cora was only bitter as she recounted memories:

"It was different when my father passed. My stepmother banned my mother from coming to the funeral. At least this time I could grieve."

There was uncomfortable silence for a bit.

"We're here for you, Cora."

"Thank you, Storm. Honestly, I'm grateful my father wasn't alive to see my divorce. That would have broken his heart more than his own did."

Kenda awkwardly tried to change the subject.

"I-I love what you've done with the place, Cora."

"You mean how empty it looks since my husband left."

"I'm sorry-"

"It's fine. I'm eleventy-one. I know how to care of myself. I-I would really rather not talk about it."

Storm tried to step in.

"Fair enough. In any case, Nerina here had something to share."

And Nerina was very enraptured to share her big news.

"I swam to the surface!"

Cora rolled her eyes at this.

"Oh boy. First time out of the ocean. How was it?"

But Nerina described it as absolute paradise.

"I have never felt anything like it! For the first time, there was no water around me; just that thing they call 'breeze.' I saw things. And for the first time I could smell things."

This last concept was very foreign to Cora.

"What's 'smell?'"

"It's hard to explain. The air carries its own scents the same way the ocean does, but the way you sense them is differently. And I finally saw the sun, and the moon, and the stars."

Kenda grew excited by the prospect of seeing the surface.

"What does the sky look like?"

"Like its own ocean with its own surface somewhere above."

"They say there's a whole other world up there as well, where the Daughters of Air live. Imagine that! Endless worlds, right on top of one another!"

Storm turned to Cora.

"Why not go to the overworld, Cora? It might do you good."

Cora sighed.

"You know I hate surface."

"You have never been."

"No. And I'll never understand it. Or why anyone would care about humans."

"How about we go exploring?" Kenda asked.

* * *

The four took a little excursion. They swam downward to where several shipwrecks rested at the bottom of the ocean. Arriving at the biggest shipwreck, they swam right in.

Cora, Storm, Nerina, and Kenda made their way through the ship, swimming into empty rooms, looking at artifacts. Finally they saw something that made them stop cold. Lying there are the drowned bodies of several sailors.

Little Kenda took this in and asked:

"Humans?"

"Yes," Nerina said solemnly.

Storm sighed.

"Another battleship. We keep seeing more and more of them these days."

Cora, having never seen humans before, stared perplexed.

"So that's what legs look like. I had seen the portraits but not like this."

She swam right up to the body of one sailor and touched his hand.

"Are they dead?" she asked.

"Have you never seen a corpse before?" Storm asked.

"No."

Kenda chimed in.

"Yes, they are dead. I've seen shark corpses before, and a few dolphins."

Kenda tried to process this.

"This is 'drowning,' isn't it? What Grand-mama was telling me about. It seems so funny that their bodies linger after they die. They don't turn to sea-foam as we do."

Cora stared at the corpse, thinking about death.

Meanwhile, Kenda swam forward and kissed the forehead of the corpse, while Cora and Storm tried to make sense of all this.

"I don't understand humans."

"War and imperialism. That's all their species does."

* * *

A few hours later, the four swam out of the ship, having collected a few artifacts. Kenda had hoarded quite a few trinkets.

"I got some new toys!" the young one bragged.

Cora stretched, pretending she was more tired than she really was.

"Well, this was fun. Thank you for the adventure, but it is time I rest on my seabed."

Nerina awkwardly said:

"Cora, I wanted to invite you to my grotto for Lunar White. I thought we could all spend the holiday together."

Cora wrinkled her nose a bit, not wanting to think that the holidays were coming up.

"Oh, thank you. But I actually invited my stepmother over for Lunar White."

Everyone looked uncomfortable at this.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Storm asked.

Cora snickered a bit.

"She is far from my favorite mermaid, and she has a-long history of hurting me-but she is the only family I have left now that my mother's dead and I want to reconnect with her. Besides, she has some of my father's things I have been wanting to pick up."

"Well, I hope it goes well," Nerina said, "You're both still welcome to come by."

"Thank you," Cora said dryly, "I have to see what she says."

Awkwardness again.

Finally Storm spoke up.

"Cora, may I speak to you for a second?"

Cora nodded, and they swam aside from the other two.

Once alone, Storm hesitated for a bit, his hair flowing in the waters, his fin barely moving.

"Look, I wouldn't say this in front of them-"

But Cora knew what was coming.

"You're going to tell me that I am being petulant and need to move on."

Storm sighed. She was making this far more uncomfortable than it needed to be.

"Oh, Cora. All of us agree that-I don't even know how to say it."

"Then just say it," Cora stated, giving him a death-glare.

So Storm just looked at her directly and was blunt.

"Your problem is you have always been too nice, and you let people walk over you or betray you."

"Uh huh," Cora said, "And that's what my husband did. And what my stepmother did. I guess I can't disagree with that."

"Yes, what Kai did to you was wrong. What your stepmother did to you was wrong. But here's my question: what is _Cora_'s story going to be?"

"I don't know."

"You are _eleventy-one_! You are an adult! You need to learn to stand up for yourself!"

And Cora just swam away, without saying goodbye.


End file.
